Courses

Choosing a course is one of the most important decisions you'll ever make! View our courses and see what our students and lecturers have to say about the courses you are interested in at the links below.

About NUI Galway

Since 1845, NUI Galway has been sharing the highest quality teaching and research with Ireland and the world. Find out what makes our University so special – from our distinguished history to the latest news and campus developments.

Engineering & Informatics

Prof. Ger Hurley B.E., M.S., Ph.D., D.Eng.

Contact Details

Title

Personal Professor

Address

Electrical & Electronic EngRoom 3048Engineering BuildingNui Galway

Telephone:

Ext. 3136

Email:

ei.yawlagiun@yelruh.drareg

Biography:

Prof. Hurley was born in Cork, Ireland. He received the B.E. degree with 1st class honours in Electrical Engineering from the National University of Ireland, Cork in 1974. In 1974 he was awarded the Irish ITT Fellowship to the U.S.A. and obtained the M.S. degree in Electrical Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge MA, in 1976. He was awarded the PhD degree at the National University of Ireland, Galway in 1988. He worked for Honeywell Controls in Canada as a Product Engineer from 1977 to 1979. He worked as a Development Engineer in transmission lines at Ontario Hydro from 1979 to 1983. He lectured in Electronic Engineering at the University of Limerick, Ireland from 1983 to 1991 and is currently Professor of Electrical Engineering at the National University of Ireland, Galway. He is the Founder/Director of the Power Electronics Research Centre at NUI, Galway. Research interests include High Frequency Magnetics, Power Quality, and Automotive Electronics. He received a Best Paper Prize for the IEEE Transactions on Power Electronics in 2000. He served on the faculty at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology as a Visiting Professor of Electrical Engineering in 1997/1998. Prof. Hurley has given invited presentations in Mexico, Japan, Singapore, Spain and Hong Kong. Prof. Hurley is a Fellow of the Institution of Engineers of Ireland and a member of Sigma Xi. He has served as an Associate Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Industrial Electronics and as a member of the Administrative Committee of the Power Electronics Society of the IEEE. He was General Chair of the IEEE Power Electronics Specialists Conference in 2000.

Research Interests

My research interests are focused in the areas of Electromagnetics, Power Electronics, and Automotive Electronics. I have published papers in five different transactions of the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) which is the most prestigious source of publications in the field of electronic engineering. Nearly half of the publications have appeared in IEEE or IEE sponsored journals and conferences. These papers covered: induction heating, electromagnetic interference from overhead power lines, transformer design, planar magnetics, magnetic suspension systems, power factor correction and battery management.
Since 1997 I have been an active collaborator with the MIT Automotive Consortium for the new 42 V automotive electrical systems, and carried out joint research on battery condition monitoring for emergency backup and automotive applications.
In the paper Calculation of Self and Mutual Impedances in Planar Magnetic Structures, I have derived from first principles a new model, which takes into account for the first time the frequency dependent losses in ferromagnetic substrates. Ongoing work on this topic is being carried out in collaboration with the National Microelectronics Research Centre at University College, Cork.
My contribution to magnetics was acknowledged by the IEEE in 1992 when I was invited to give a one-day seminar on the topic at the Power Electronics Specialists Conference in Toledo, Spain. I was also invited to give the keynote address at the V IEEE International Power Electronics Congress in Cuernavaca, Mexico, October 1996. The paper Optimizing the A.C. Resistance of Multilayer Transformer Windings with Arbitrary Current Waveforms obtained a Best Paper Prize in the IEEE Transactions on Power Electronics in 2000. Invited papers have been presented in Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore and Spain.
In 2002 I was invited to become Editor-in-Chief of the IEEE Transactions on Power Electronics, the most prestigious journal in the field.
In 1989 I received 220,000 funding from Enterprise Ireland to establish the Power Conversion Laboratory in the University of Limerick.
In 1991 I received funding from Enterprise Ireland to establish the Power Electronics Research Centre at NUI, Galway. Total funding of 1.7 million was obtained between 1992 and 2003.
In 1992 I successfully applied for the Hewlett Packard Award of 133,000 worth of test and measurement equipment. This award is open to all Universities in the U.K. and Ireland and this was only the second award in Ireland.
In 1993 I was elected by my peers worldwide, to one of 20 seats in the Administrative Committee of the Power Electronics Society of the IEEE.
In 1994 I organised the 29th Universities Power Engineering Conference (UPEC'29) which was hosted by NUI, Galway. This was the first time that this conference was held outside the U.K. and it set a new record for abstracts received and total delegates.
In 2000 I chaired the 31st IEEE Power Electronics Specialists Conference (PESC'00), which is held in Europe every 4 years. There is intense competition from all over Europe to host this conference as it is seen as the premier event on the Power Electronics calendar. The conference set a new record for abstracts (600) and attracted 550 delegates and guests to NUI, Galway in June 2000.

Conference Publications

L Zhang, W G Hurley, W H Wölfle (2010) - A New Approach to Achieve Maximum Power Point Tracking for PV System with a Variable Inductor. 2nd International Symposium on Power Electronics for Distributed Generation Systems Hefei, China, [Details]

Armstrong, S and Hurley, W G (2005) - Investigation of the Harmonic Response of a Photovoltaic System with a Solar Emulator. 11th European Conference on Power Electronics and Applications Proceedings of the 11th European Conference on Power Electronics and Applications Dresden, Germany, , pp.1-8 [Details]

Armstrong, S and Hurley, W G (2004) - Self-regulating Maximum Power Point Tracking for Solar Energy Systems. 39th Universities Power Engineering Conference Proceedings of the 39th Universities Power Engineering Conference University of the West of England, Bristol, , pp.604-608 [Details]

Butler, M, Hurley, W G and Wölfle, W (1997) - Active Power Factor Correction of a Single Stage AC-DC Converter with Reactive Power Control. 7th European Conference on Power Electronics and Applications Proceedings of the 7th European Conference on Power Electronics and Applications Trondheim, Norway, , pp.176-181 [Details]

Butler, M, Hurley, W G and Wölfle, W (1997) - 7th European Conference on Power Electronics and Applications Proceedings of the 7th European Conference on Power Electronics and Applications Trondheim, Norway, , pp.176-181 [Details]

Collins, J J and Hurley, W G (1994) - Application of Expert Systems and Neural Networks to the Diagnosis of Power Quality Problems. Third International Conference on Power Quality Proceedings of the Third International Conference on Power Quality Amsterdam, The Netherlands, [Details]

McKernan, D, Suttle, D and Hurley, W G (1994) - Power Quality at a Satellite Earth Station: A Case Study. Third International Conference on Power Quality Proceedings of the Third International Conference on Power Quality Amsterdam, The Netherlands, [Details]

Hurley, W G and McNamara, P S (1991) - Characterization of Transformer Cores Using a New Mutual Impedance Formula. 4th European Conference on Power Electronics and Applications Proceedings of the 4th European Conference on Power Electronics and Applications Florence, Italy, , pp.452-457 [Details]

Hurley, W G and McNamara, P S (1991) - 4th European Conference on Power Electronics and Applications Proceedings of the 4th European Conference on Power Electronics and Applications Florence, Italy, , pp.452-457 [Details]